King v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF PRINCE GEORGE'S CTY.

731 A.2d 460

354 Md. 369

Ronnchey Lynn KING v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF PRINCE GEORGE'S COUNTY.

No. 113, Sept. Term, 1998.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

June 10, 1999.

Kim M. DiGovanni (Thomas V. Mike Miller, Jr., P.A., on brief) of Clinton, for petitioner.

Andrew W. Nussbaum (Knight, Manzi, Nussbaum, and LaPlaca, P.A., of Upper Marlboro) on brief, for respondent.

Argued before BELL, C.J., and ELDRIDGE, RODOWSKY, CHASANOW, RAKER, WILNER and CATHELL, JJ RAKER, Judge.

In this case we are called upon to revisit the issue of "mental-mental" claims as occupational diseases under the Maryland Workers' Compensation Act. Ronnchey Lynn King (Petitioner) claims that as a result of her responsibilities as a transportation assistant for the Board of Education of Prince George's County (Respondent), she suffered from a stress-related, compensable occupational disease. We shall hold that Petitioner's mental illness is not "due to the nature of an employment in which hazards of the occupational disease exist," and, as a result, her illness is not a compensable occupational disease under the Act. Accordingly, we shall affirm the trial court's grant of summary judgment in favor of Respondent.

I.

On September 14, 1983, Petitioner began her employment with the Board of Education of Prince George's County as a substitute bus driver. In October, 1984, she became a full time bus driver and in October, 1988, she was promoted to auxiliary bus driver. Her duties included driving buses for absent bus drivers and updating "run sheets" on the computer. In that position, she averaged twelve hours per day, five days per week, in addition to some hours working in her home. In June, 1990, she was promoted to assistant foreman. As assistant foreman, she typically worked twelve hours per day, five days per week during the regular school year, including additional hours spent working at home; and, eight hours per day, five days per week during the summer months, for which she was not compensated. In September, 1991, she was promoted to transportation technician, where she worked in excess of twelve hours per day, five days per week, year round. In September, 1992, she was promoted to transportation assistant; according to King, she was then performing her new duties as transportation assistant as well as her old duties of transportation technician. King testified that from September, 1992 to July 1, 1995, she was responsible for many of the duties of transportation management analyst, such as routing and scheduling. In 1995, she was offered the position of transportation management analyst, effective July 1, 1995. After the person hired to perform the job of transportation assistant left after only two days on the job, King testified that she performed the jobs of three people: transportation technician, transportation assistant, and transportation management analyst.

Petitioner began seeing Dr. Ralph Wadeson, a psychiatrist, in March of 1995. In September of 1995, Dr. Wadeson diagnosed Petitioner with somatization disorder ¹ and major depression. On October 16, 1995, Petitioner suffered what she characterizes as a breakdown. She left work and "just busted out crying and felt like if [she] didn't lay down [she] was going to die, sick to [her] stomach." Dr. Wadeson noted that her symptoms in October, 1995 included nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and chest pains, and her symptoms in December, 1995 included pain, headaches, pain in her abdomen, chest and hip, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, cramping in her gastrointestinal system, loss of libido, balance problems, confusion in her verbalizations, and unsteadiness on her feet. Dr. Wadeson opined that her somatization disorder was "a result of the extreme stress of her job." Dr. Bruce Smoller also evaluated King and concluded that she showed significant personality disorder (somatization disorder and dysthymia) and depression, both of which he felt to be "unrelated to her work situation but alter[ing] her response to her work situation."

Petitioner filed a claim with the Maryland Workers' Compensation Commission on April 1, 1996, alleging that she suffered from an occupational disease. She described the occupational disease as "Nervous Breakdown resulting from three different positions at one time. Also putting in 12-14 hours a day to keep up." After a hearing on July 26, 1996, the Workers' Compensation Commission disallowed Petitioner's claim, finding that "the claimant did not sustain an occupational disease (stress) arising out of and in the course of employment as alleged to have occurred on October 16, 1995."

Petitioner filed a Petition for Judicial Review in the Circuit Court for Prince George's County. Respondent filed a Motion for Summary Judgment, arguing that Petitioner's illness could not qualify as an occupational disease because "[t]here is nothing peculiar, customary or usual about Ms. King's duties as a transportation assistant that makes her more susceptible to stress, anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder than any other kind of employment or the general population." In opposition to that motion, Petitioner argued that her claim was "the culmination of several years of excessively long and stressful workdays," during which she was "consistently required to remain at work for twelve or more hours each day," "frequently found it necessary to spend several more hours each night in her home on work-related tasks," "was responsible for scheduling the transportation of tens of thousands of Prince George's County school children on a daily basis," and "was expected to perform the jobs of two and three people due to budget cuts, under staffing, and the inadequate or complete lack of job training received by her coworkers." ² At the conclusion of the hearing, the court granted Respondent's Motion for Summary Judgment, finding that Petitioner did not sustain an occupational disease arising out of and in the course of her employment.³

Petitioner appealed to the Court of Special Appeals. 123 Md.App. 73, 716 A.2d 1077 (1998). The intermediate court affirmed, initially observing that the disposition of the case was dependent on whether the case was governed by Davis v. Dyncorp, 336 Md. 226, 647 A.2d 446 (1994), or Means v. Baltimore County, 344 Md. 661, 689 A.2d 1238 (1997). Id. at 82, 716 at 1082. After reviewing these cases, the court determined that Petitioner's illness did not qualify as a compensable occupational disease under the Act. Id. at 88, 716 A.2d at 1084. The court reasoned:

Under Means, a stress-induced mental disorder may constitute a compensable occupational disease only if the stress is created by conditions particular and peculiar to the general nature of the employment. The type of difficult working conditions under which appellant worked—e.g., long hours, uncooperative coworkers, unreasonable supervisors, insufficient resources—are pervasive across many types of occupations and are not uniquely characteristic of any particular occupation. Further, as the trial court observed, there was no evidence in this case to suggest that the stressful conditions were a result of anything other than mismanagement of the position; such conditions were not, as in Means, an inseparable and unavoidable characteristic of the job duties and responsibilities.

Id. at 84, 716 A.2d at 1083.

We granted certiorari to consider the following question:

Whether the Court of Special Appeals erred in affirming the trial court's decision to grant summary judgment in favor of the Board of Education of Prince George's County based on its opinion that Petitioner's stress-related disorder is not compensable as an occupational disease as defined in Section 9-502 of the Labor and Employment Article of the Annotated Code of Maryland.

II.

According to Petitioner, the circuit court erred in granting summary judgment because the facts support that (1) Petitioner suffered an occupational disease as the result of and in the course of her employment; (2) the occupational disease caused Petitioner to become incapacitated; (3) the occupational disease that caused Petitioner's disability was due to the nature of an employment in which hazards of the occupational disease exist; and (4) on the weight of the evidence, it reasonably may be concluded that the occupational disease was incurred as a result of the employment of Petitioner. Petitioner argues that whether the nature of Petitioner's employment involved a hazard of contracting somatization disorder and/or major depression is a question of fact that should have been decided by a jury after considering all of the evidence. Petitioner contends that the stressful conditions under which she worked were inseparable and unavoidable characteristics of her job, and that her mental injury gradually developed over time as a result of these conditions. Petitioner argues that despite the Court of Special Appeals holding that Petitioner's working conditions are pervasive across many types of occupations, "ensuring the safe transport of thousands of school children on a daily basis, pacifying irate parents and principals due to bus overcrowding, and being forced to work long hours while performing the duties of three different positions are not pervasive across many types of occupations, and therefore, are uniquely characteristic of Petitioner's employment." Petitioner contends that nothing in the Act requires that the hazard of the occupational disease be uniquely characteristic of a particular occupation; the hazard must simply be uniquely characteristic of the specific job in which Petitioner is employed. Petitioner argues that "[w]hile somatization disorder and/or major depression may not be a hazard incident to employment by any other board of education, it is a hazard incident to serving as an employee of the transportation department of the Board of Education of Prince George's County." Respondent counters that Maryland law requires that in order for an...